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The pleas started landing in my inbox long before Donald Trump secured the Republican nomination that would take him back to the White House.
Craig was having a hard time stomaching the pictures we were running of what he called the “Orange Menace.’’ He understood news was our job and that Trump was often in the news. Still, he couldn’t face seeing that face in our pages. And by the time Trump won the presidential election in November, Craig was prepared to turn the page on the Free Press.
“I’m being facetious but I realize that out of concern for my mental health I might have to cancel my subscription to avoid seeing the damage he’s doing,” Craig said in his note to me on Nov. 12.
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“I’m not sending a threat. This is a genuine concern of mine. I find his return to the presidency to be unbelievable and I have to work hard to avoid thinking about it.”
I hadn’t thought much about my exchanges with Craig until this week when it became clear he was far from alone when it came to readers tired of Trump’s face time on our pages.
I’ve had emails echoing Craig’s concerns as have my newsroom colleagues. There was even a phone call that offered similar complaints nestled within a compliment over Monday’s tariff coverage delivered without a single image of the 47th president.
I recognize we are barely two weeks into his new presidential reality TV show, but his “flood-the-zone” style of governing by executive edicts has him creating headlines and the accompanying images of him in a way that threatens to overwhelm not only the Craigs of the world but those of us in journalism paid to keep up with the never-ending plot twists and turns.
Tariffs coming. Tariffs imposed. Tariffs paused. And just when we think we are starting to digest what this trade war means, Trump decides it’s time for the United States to take over Gaza in order to create a “Riviera of the Middle East.”
Take a deep breath. It’s going to be a long four years.
Given the nature of the U.S. presidency, the media will always zoom in on the person sitting in the Oval Office. So, to Craig and others urging me to do a journalistic about-face, I’m sorry but the Free Press won’t become a Trump visage-free zone.
What I can promise, however, is you will increasingly see photos of the faces of Manitobans standing up to Trump in this trade war and his ongoing attacks on our sovereignty. Our cameras are focusing on the politicians, the business leaders, the farmers, workers and grocers who are in this faceoff over the future of our economy.
Trump being Trump, means he will always crave attention, always desperate to dominate every news cycle. But he can’t and won’t control the reality our photojournalists will capture of the fight being waged. So, look away if you must, from those images of Trump.
Just don’t lose sight of how the Free Press will document frame by frame the faces of those on this side of the border who are on our side.
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